How To Sell Art Online - Part 1

How to Sell Art Online

25 ways to really sell art online.

Over the years I've been selling art online in various different ways, from websites that promote your art, to eBay, to selling on my own blog and website.

In this article I'm going to cover some different ways of selling art online and hopefully give you some good solutions to what you can do to make some money in your career as an artist.

I will discuss things like online sites and eBay as well as marketing to your list of followers and subscribers and previous buyers. I have also included an in-depth explanation of each method i used through the links at the end of each section. This would contain both my personal experience and learning together with the other online videos i have deemed to be helpful to you in your journey to be a successful online selling artist.

1. How to Sell art on eBay

For a long time I sold 4 paintings a week online on eBay, week in and week out and it provided a good source of income for me. At the time I was involved in the daily painting movement where I did a “painting a day” and it was a great avenue to sell those quick little studies that I could do in a couple hours.

For me, these were the secrets to selling on eBay:

Sell your paintings at auction and start the bidding at $99. Don't start the price at $10 because you may end up just getting a couple bids and end up selling a nice painting for only $25. I found that selling them for $99 was good place to start and I was okay with that amount for a painting that only took a couple of hours.

The next secret tip was that I always showed the paintings in a frame and explained that the frame was an additional charge because the painting actually came unframed. This way it allowed me to up-sell them a frame and it made a better presentation, which didn't hurt.

Another positive idea for selling on eBay was always putting 4 paintings on every Sunday (I found it worked best for me to put paintings up on eBay on Sunday evening, for one week, and have the auctions end on the following Sunday evening about 7 p.m.). Collectors could count on that and would always look for the new paintings, on that schedule, each week which really helped me develop a solid following. Once you have a following this allows for more competitive bidding between my collectors. Each week there was something for them to look at, get excited about and purchase. I played around a little bit with fixed pricing on eBay but really found that the best results came from auctions starting at $99. I did this for a long time but eventually I got away from daily painting. Nonetheless, this was a really good way to sell studies. I hope it's successful for you too. This was the way I did it and I am sure there are other people that sell on eBay and do well too... good luck!

It's important to take note that there are other strategies you could utilize when using eBay to market your art. Among these would be:

Checking the listings of the genre of your artwork and comparing its prices with others on the same listing. It would be important to take note of the size of the painting and the quality of artwork.

Getting your rating up would definitely increase your selling ratio. Everybody loves a seller who keeps to his word and delivers exactly what's listed on-site. Customers would eventually give you reviews that would either bring you down or raise you up! Make sure to deliver your part of the deal and the rest would take care of itself!

Here’s a quick guide on how you could set up your account (Buyer or seller you can register the same way):

Go to http://www.ebay.com and on the top left click on “register”.

Type in your details & the verification code presented.

You can easily convert personal accounts to business accounts.

Click on the submit button.

You can see the eBay user ID given to you (you can edit this as well).

Click “My eBay” on the upper right hand corner to access your “Dashboard”.

Linking your PayPal account and eBay account is as simple as clicking the “sell” button on the upper left site of the screen just beside “Help & Contact”.

Here’s a quick guide on how to set up a listing:

On your “Dashboard” click on sell.

Type in what your selling.

Check for the category if it’s correct.

Scroll down over where you can see proceed to listings category.

Fill in the details and a short description & add photos.

Choose if its a fixed price or an auction.

Set the price.

Click on the “Add a buy it now option…”.

Pick the listing duration and schedule it.

Here's how to check if you've sold a product you listed:

Head over to your dashboard "My eBay".

Head over to the left hand corner under "Sell".

You could see an option that says "Sold".

Knowing these 3 things (setting up an account, listing your item, checking if its sold) would definitely help you get started with eBay and could be the foundation of your online shop. There are various methods to enhance your listings on eBay and tips on how to further improve your ranking just below this section. If you'd want to learn more in-depth about eBay this is where you'd want to start!

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Daniel Edmondson in his Studio

About Me

Daniel Edmondson's Painting Tips and Tricks. A well collected artist trained in the classical style, Daniel Edmondson brings Old Master painting into the modern using contemporary themes and expressive brushwork. Edmondson's masterful handling of paint is a combination of light and shadow with nuances of broken color. In painting portrait and figure, still life, and landscape; there is a keen sense of richness of color, balance and movement in his work. His dramatic use of light captivates your eye as you wander through the painting.
Daniel lives in Fort Collins, Colorado with his family. Daniel has studied at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Palette and Chisel in Chicago, the Loveland Academy of Fine Art , the Fechin Institute in Taos, New Mexico, the Scottsdale Artists' School in Scottsdale, Arizona, and The Arts Students League in Denver, Colorado.
Daniel Edmondson has works placed in private collections in Austria, Canada, England, Germany, Iceland, Spain and the United States and has won numerous top awards in exhibitions and museum shows.